From this week one of London's most prestigious five star hotels will be flying the Orkney flag to announce its high profile promotion of the county. 

In a deal between the Langham Hilton and the Orkney Marketing Scheme, a vast array of Orkney's food and drink products will take pride of place on the hotel's menus for its Memories gourmet restaurant, the Palm Court lounge, the Chuka Bar and the Tsars Bar as well as room service meals.

Overseeing the preparation of the food will be two Orcadian chefs.  Paul Doull of the Foveran Hotel and Alan Craigie of the Creel Restaurant at South Ronaldsay will be working alongside the hotel's Executive Chef to provide complete authenticity to the dishes.

To further raise the profile, three groups of Orcadian musicians will be playing traditional Orkney music in the hotel's bars and restaurants during the three weeks of the promotion, and information on the food, the drink and the islands will be provided by an information desk also staffed by Orcadians throughout the period.

The deal was concluded last year following a period of negotiation culminating in a visit by the hotel's executive management to Orkney as guests of the Marketing Scheme to meet members of Orkney Quality Food & Drink and to inspect their food processing factories.

John Clarke, who negotiated the deal on behalf of the Marketing Scheme explained:  "This promotion is an important part of our programme of building awareness of "Orkney the Brand", and the values that the brand represents, to our target market.  We identified the Langham as one of a small number of London hotels that would make an ideal partner for this type of event but it was necessary to convince the senior management that this would be quite different to the numerous Scottish events that are staged at various venues in the capital.  However, once the Langham was able to see that Orkney really is distinctive and different it was only necessary to let them taste the food and drink to convince them that this would be an exciting initiative. From that point on, the most difficult job has been to keep the project under wraps to prevent one of Orkney's competitors finding out about it and copying it with another hotel."

Speaking for the Langham Hilton, Georg Fuchs, the hotel's Executive Chef, added:  "When I'm looking for a unique taste the Orkney Islands immediately come to mind.  My visit there was a beautiful experience and I feel very privileged to have the opportunity to preserve a little bit of that experience in London.  Nowhere in the world will you get this exquisite combination of tastes - Orkney bere bannock with traditional cheese and fresh oysters.  It is like angels making love on your tongue."

During the last few weeks the hotel has been stocking up on the county's award winning and coveted whiskies and beer and this week the first shipment of food left Orkney for delivery into the Langham.  Stewart Crichton, Chairman of the Orkney Quality Food & Drink Group, is clearly delighted with the outcome of this initiative and said:  "I am very pleased and proud that Orkney is, once again, leading the way with regional promotion.   The continual building of the Orkney brand has had a very positive effect on the marketability of our members' products and events such as this, focused on one of our prime target markets, are extremely helpful."